A balanced life is a beautifully messy constant work-in-progress

What’s It All About?

For the longest time, my beauty regimen was minimal: face wash, toner, acne spot treatment, moisturizer, sunscreen, eyeshadow primer, eyeshadow, eyeliner, done. I might do a clay mask every once in a while, but most of them would dry out before I got around to using them up. I was a Beauty Insider at Sephora, but I basically only shopped there when I ran out of eyeshadow primer or to pick up my free birthday gift. I grew up doing ballet and dance team, so I was no stranger to makeup–I just had little patience for it, and it didn’t really bring me any joy. I did the absolute minimum to (mostly) take care of my skin and to look awake when I showed up to work. I did some research when trying to find the best tattoo coverage method for my wedding (if only I knew what I know now!), but I was functional at best when it came to beauty in general. Everything changed when my husband bought me an ipsy subsription in May of 2017.

From there, I was hooked, and I quickly dove head-first into the world of beauty and self care. I started following some of the ipsy creators on Instagram and Youtube, which led me to other beauty gurus on Youtube; I joined the Ultamate Rewards Program at Ulta (and went Platinum in less than 6 months–oops!), and I stepped up my beauty game, like whoa. I cleaned old, expired junk out of my makeup armoire, started experimenting with new cosmetics and skincare products, got over my aversion to liquid foundation…it’s been a journey already, and I’ve only scratched the surface.

By the end of summer 2017, I felt inspired to work on uncovering my best self, both inside and out. I was soaking up all the beauty knowledge I could, so surface beauty: check. My husband and I already ate healthier than the average American (most of the time–this is all about balance, right?), so eating well: check, but there’s always room for improvement. I wasn’t working out as regularly as I should because I always felt strapped for time and having a back injury made high-intensity workouts nearly impossible–I was also good at coming up with excuses, can you tell? If I left my workout until after work, I’d manage to reason my way out of doing it by the time I got home. So to eliminate that temptation, I decided to start getting up at 4:15 every morning to do a Yoga or Pilates video on Youtube. After just one month, I could feel my back getting stronger, which meant I could start pushing myself to do more challenging exercises. I even managed to start jogging again without being in excruciating pain the next day. Since August 14, 2017, I have worked out every. single. day. Some days that’s a HIIT workout, and other days that’s just a deep stretching session, but I can feel the difference. (My Move Streak on my Apple Watch is a huge motivator–I want to close all the rings every day!) So being active: check.

Between the beauty gurus promoting more products than you could ever use (or afford), the diet “experts” promoting the latest miracle food plan, and the exercise know-it-alls promoting the latest workout regimen that will help you drop 10 pounds in 2 days, it’s an overwhelming amount of information to sift through and assess. Being an expert in any one of those fields is literally a full-time job, and my full-time job isn’t in any of them.

I’m not claiming to have all the answers, but I’m willing to share what I learn, and I’m hoping to learn some things from you. Let me tell you about things I’ve tried and love, others I’ve tried that weren’t worth it, and–even more exciting–things I can’t wait to try! Who knows? Maybe you’ll be the one to introduce me to my next favorite thing that I never would have heard of otherwise! None of us have it all figured out, but let’s see what we can come up with together.